Transcription and background information needed.

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Are_You_Going_Home_Now/zGhLCgAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22or+else+get+away%22+%22you+young+fellows%22&pg=PA125&printsec=frontcover

THE RED HATS OF IRELAND

Asleep or awaking my poor heart is breaking,
To think I am leaving the land I adore,
In stable or manger my life is in danger,
And I'm going like a stranger from old Erin's shore.

May bad luck shine down on those Red Hats of Ireland,
Who want me to work for sixpence a day.
For to keep from starvation without hesitation,
And as a free emigration I'm now going away.

For we don't want them here, they may go like bad weather,
And send me the day I'll fire out nine or ten,
When five, six or eight of those whelps get together,
'Tis then they'll run down the poor labouring men.

For their dinner comes on boys between twelve and one,
Either mutton or ham they adore on their plate,
For the shamrocks and herrings are as quietly concerned,
And that is the treatment we are getting of late.

But I will not run down what God sends to the ground,
But I am bound to describe out and out,
For the supper was made for the man on the spade,
By that material they call stirabout.

The supper was made for the man on the spade ,
By some luke warm water they rise from the dyke,
And it's thrown on the hob till it gathers. 'blob! blob!'
'It will do them damn well, let it boil if it likes.'

Come all you young fellows, from me take a warning,
From your home to a Red Hat let you never stray,
For if you get sick you are wanting no longer,
You may go to the Union or else get away.

Source: Are You Going Home Now? (Memories of Old Kilkea)
By Mícheál Ó Dubhshláine · 2015 - page 125 from Google Preview

Sung for the author by Johnny Mulhall of Geraldine, Athy.